"SAVE THE GOGS ! "
[To the 'Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—The Cambridge Preservation Society is now well under way with the Appeal to preserve the Gog Magog Hills from the advance of building, which daily creeps nearer to their lower slopes and threatens to cover them completely, if immediate steps are not taken to stem the tide. The Appeal was launched by the Mayor of Cambridge at a crowded meeting in the Guildhall, at which Mr. Hugh Walpole and Mr. H. V. Morton urged the importance of saving these hills as one of the quiet places which are becoming more and more A necessity of the age and increasingly difficult to find. They stressed the point that the question was not one of romantic sentiment and idealism, but of stark necessity, if we are to survive as a sane and sentient race in this era of noise and speed.
The task is a heavy one, but not too heavy for the combined efforts of County, Town and University. All these are sympathetic. The County and the Town have through the Town Planning Authority given invaluable help by the zoning of key-points and the Lnest natural features of the area as Open Spaces : but money is wanted to pay the necessary compensation to the owners. The two Colleges immediately involved as owners of large stretches of the Hills, Caius and Peterhouse, have stated their willingness to co-operate with the Society and their neighbours to the limit of their ability. They must take into account their position as trustees of educational endowments, but subject to that they will do all they can. Their encouragement has been most heartening. Other Colleges promise financial help, feeling no doubt that the " Gogs " form the most important piece of countryside near Cambridge. It must, of course, be admitted that the Hills rise but two hundred and thirty feet. But they risc from the vast flats of Fenland. They are rightly named of Giants.
Luckily, the task is divisible. There is breathing-space for part : short for the areas zoned under Town Planning : longer for the Golf Links, protected by a lease ; the property known as Vandlebury (where is the grave of the Godolphin Arabian), owned and occupied by a keen sympathiser ; and the outlying portions at present above the effective limit of water supply.
Two areas are urgent. One, on Hills Road, was bought
some years ago for development as a housing estate by a building speculator, who quotes a building price for re-sale. It lies in a beautiful position ; beautiful from the builder's point of view—and it is ripe for him—but more beautiful as an essential part of the scheme to Save the Gogs. The saving of this, however, may also save the other side of the road, belonging to Caius College, who would be willing to come to an arrangement for sterilisation of their frontage to Hills Road, if the great area opposite were saved. Perhaps £20,000 will be needed for this section of the scheme. The second is on Worts Causeway, the other road through the hills ; it is owned by St. Thomas's Hospital. Development has already reached the fringes of the Hospital's lands and its obligations compel it to look very carefully at the value of land rapidly ripening for development. £15,000 may be the sum required to deal with this section ; but here a Donor might by one and the same gift both endow a great Hospital and also preserve a great landscape.
The total sum needed for the complete scheme to Save
the Gogs is in the neighbourhood of £50,000. As a start, the Trustees of the Pilgrim Trust, holding as they do that it is of National importance to preserve as far as possible the beauty and dignity of the settings of our ancient Universities, have most generously promised £5,000, if a further £i5,000 is raised by the spring of 1939. To lose this offer or to lose the fight for the " Gogs " are alike unthinkable. We pray the help with small sums or with great of all those who have enjoyed the privilege of residence in Cambridge, who perhaps know and love the "Gogs," and of all those who feel that the preservation of the countryside is one of the crying needs of the time.
Donations to the Gogs Preservation Fund may be sent either to the Hon. Secretary, Cambridge Preservation Society, Cambridgeshire House, 7 Hills Road, Cambridge, or to the Hon. Treasurer, Barclays Bank, Ltd., Bene'r Street, Cam- bridge.—I have the honour to be, Sir, your obedient servant,
H. I. FYJIS-WALKER, Joint Hon. Secretary, Cambridge Preservation Society.
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